But Alexander, after returning from the funeral pyre and assembling many
of his friends and officers for supper, proposed a contest in drinking
neat wine, the victor to be crowned. Well, then, the one who drank the
most, Promachus, got as far as four pitchers;chous,
or
At Susa he brought to pass the marriage of his companions, took to wife
himself the daughter of Dareius, Stateira, assigned the noblest women to
his noblest men, and gave a general wedding feast for those of his
Macedonians who had already contracted other marriages. At this feast,
we are told, nine thousand guests reclined at supper, to each of whom a
golden cup for the libations was given. All the other appointments too,
were amazingly splendid, and the host paid himself the debts which his
guests owed, the whole outlay amounting to nine thousand eight hundred
and seventy talents.
Now Antigenes, the One-eyed, had got himself enrolled as a debtor fraudulently and, on producing somebody who affirmed that he had made a loan to him at the bank, the money was paid over; then his fraud was discovered, and the king, in anger, drove him from his court and deprived him of his command. Antigenes, however, was a splendid soldier, and while he was still a young man and Philip was besieging Perinthus, though a bolt from a catapult smote him in the eye, he would not consent to have the bolt taken out nor give up fighting until he had repelled the enemy and shut them up within their walls.
Accordingly, he could not endure with any complacency the disgrace that now fell upon him, but was evidently going to make away with himself from grief and despondency. So the king, fearing this, put away his wrath and ordered him to keep the money.